Monday, January 23, 2017

Women's March: Proof of Privilege

The international day of women's marches held this weekend, intended to protest a lack of women's rights in America, is all the proof you need that women are the privileged gender in America.

The women's march was allegedly in favor of women's rights, although the marchers were unable to articulate any rights they lack. What normally they mention is rights to abortion (why is it always the right to kill unborn babies they fall back to?) But the thing is they do have that right. Roe v. Wade was a Supreme Court ruling that opted to violate the 10th Amendment to the US Constitution just to give women that right. One liberal woman I've spoken to on the issue says that the ruling doesn't matter when getting an abortion can be so difficult. Her example was that women in rural Arkansas must sometimes drive over a hundred miles to abortion clinics. Apparently women lack the right to overcome the laws of supply & demand. How much demand do you think there is for abortion clinics in rural Arkansas? Enough to justify one in each town? Because such a practice is obviously not profitable, I suppose they're advocating that those clinics be provided by the government. As usual, the protest is for the right to have the government take money from other citizens. In this case as a matter of convenience for abortion customers.

But again abortion is a right granted by the government. What they seem to marching against is future attacks on their rights, which they are sure are imminent under President Trump. They feel the election was an attack on women, but in a vague and hypothetical sense.

It's always more insightful to judge people by their actions and not their words. In that light some of the marchers did demonstrate a number of rights they lack.

The right to light a woman's hair on fire.

The right to punch a woman in the face.

The right to stone a woman to death for traveling without a male relative escort.

The last is a tweet from the head organizer of the marches, who advocates for Sharia Law. Liberals see no contradiction in this. (Remember they are unprincipled.)

To be fair I don't actually think most women in the marches were marching for those things. I don't think they were marching as political action at all. It was more of group therapy for a crowd who pulled out all the stops of Identity Politics in this election, who went completely unrestrained to get Hillary elected over Trump, and who still lost. It's just a sign that they're moving towards the bargaining stage of grief. In fact because of this I do not oppose the marches in and of themselves.

Women are permitted to march across the country, to protect women's rights from hypothetical future attacks. Women can organize for their rights. It doesn't even matter what their arguments are. Society permits it. Can you imagine an organized day of men's marches? There are actually Men's Rights activists (MRAs) in America, and they are widely shamed, ridiculed, and condemned. They are told they are sexist misogynistic bigots when they attempt to organize. Even more they are called whiny wimps who aren't "real men". They would never in this environment rally enough support to have national marches of any significance, and even if they did, they would certainly be met by leftist violence. And that violence would be met with mainstream support. Just look at how people are gloating about Richard Spencer being sucker-punched by a leftist. I don't know much about Spencer, but I don't believe that he has ever imposed violence against his political opponents, or advocated for it. Violent suppression of free political speech now has mainstream support from the left. Ridicule of MRAs has mainstream support as well. Violence against national MRA marches would be widely supported.

Women are allowed to organize for their rights. Men are not. The marches were merely a demonstration by women that they have more rights than men in this country.

2 comments:

The International Day of Women’s Marches held this weekend, intended to protest the lack of women’s rights around the world, is all the proof you need that women are unsatisfied with the direction of the world. As is their right.

The women's march was held in favor of not only women’s rights, but also the rights of LGBTQ communities, immigration, religion, environmental protections, and healthcare, all of which were well articulated and could be easily understood by those who chose to look beyond biased media and circulating memes. One of the rights mentioned, probably most frequently due largely in part to current events and politics, is women’s right to abortion. Women fight for the right to make a well-informed decision based on their own unique situations, not for the blatantly vague ‘right to kill unborn babies.’ And while that right might be protected now, an overturn of Roe vs. Wade could very well be a likely future event as our new President himself has said, “I am pro-life, and I will be appointing pro-life judges.” When asked if his goal was to overturn Roe vs. Wade, he replied, “well if we put another two or perhaps three judges on that’s really what’s - that’s going to happen, that’ll happen automatically in my opinion because I am putting pro-life justices on the court.” So while we can argue that a woman’s right to choose is protected, we cannot say with definite certainty that it will remain that way. A study published in 2004 by Guttmacher Institute in New York surveyed 1,209 abortion patients at 11 different providers to determine the reasons that women in the U.S. seek abortion services. While this study leaves a lot to be desired because of the low number of participants surveyed, it helps to provide some insight on why women choose that route. We cannot argue the fact that some women have abortions because they are simply unprepared, but even that reason comes with its own set of subreasons - i.e., not married, recent break-up, mental health, finances, abusive partner, rape. Even in cases where a woman is prepared, health concerns could be the reason either with the mother or the baby. To judge abortion as a solution to a single problem is not only extremely short-sighted, it’s unfair. But on the other side of the coin, we can argue this issue for days because no matter the reason for getting an abortion, the end result will always be the termination of a pregnancy and people for whatever reason cannot seem to look beyond that. Especially those who have never been faced with that decision. Especially, men. However, as it stands, women who need/want an abortion do not have an easy time obtaining one whether she has to drive 100 miles or 5 to the nearest clinic that provides them. The barriers that women face to get one, and the barriers clinics face to provide them are many.

With any party or protest, there are always those that are there with questionable motives or actions. However, the few do not represent the many, and the tactic of trying to define a party by the actions of a few outcasts alone are one of the many parts of the problem we face today. The Women’s March that occurred in January was not an event led by one, but an event led by many and one that had people participating WORLDWIDE. While Linda Sarsour was a prominent organizer of the event, and certainly has some strong opinions about Sharia Law, her opinion in no way mirrors those of all the women in America. And while some women (and men) might have indeed been caught up in the excitement that an organized protest presents, dismissing it entirely because of a difference of opinion doesn’t make any of it a non-issue. Hillary might have lost, but those that opposed Trump aren’t going to be silenced on issues that are important to them simply because he won. Women are permitted to march across the country, and so are men. Women can organize for their rights. And so can men. It doesn't even matter what their arguments are. As is our right.

What have you fixed? Those are all fine arguments, but they completely circumvent the core thesis of my post. Sure men and women both have the legal right to march, but only women have the social privilege to do so. A men's march would be widely condemned as sexist and misogynist, would be ridiculed by the media, and would be met with violence from leftist that would find mainstream support. If you doubt that, then look at how men's rights activists are treated already, and they are a very tiny group.